Comment-to-DM: How to Turn “Price?” Comments Into Sales

Scroll through the comments on any busy product post in Nepal and you'll see the same thing: "price?", "details", "available?", "dm". Each one is a person who is interested enough to type. Most of them never get a reply, or get one hours later, by which time they've bought from the page that answered first.

Comment-to-DM automation fixes this. When someone comments a keyword, they get a private message straight away with the details they asked for, and the conversation continues in their inbox.

How it works

1. You choose a post, reel or ad, or set it up for all your posts.
2. You pick trigger words: "price", "details", "link", "info", or anything that fits your campaign.
3. When someone comments one of those words, they automatically get a private message.
4. Optionally, the comment gets a short public reply too, like "Check your DMs 💜".
5. From there, the conversation carries on in DMs, either with set follow-up messages or with an AI that answers whatever they ask next.

It works on Instagram and Facebook posts, reels and ads, and on TikTok. The comment-to-DM page shows what this looks like in Orbit.

Why not just reply in the comments?

You can, but there are good reasons to move the conversation into DMs:

• Competitors read your comments too. Posting prices publicly makes their job easy.
• DMs convert better. In a private chat you can ask for the size, colour and delivery address and actually close the order.
• You can follow up. A DM conversation gives you a thread to come back to; a comment reply usually doesn't.
• It scales. On a post that takes off, nobody can reply to hundreds of comments by hand.

Choosing good trigger words

Think about what your customers actually type, not what you wish they typed. For most Nepali pages that means covering the common spellings:

• price, prices, rate, kati, kati ho
• details, detail, info, information
• available, stock, cha
• link, order, dm

Use a campaign keyword when you want to measure a specific post: "Comment GLOW for the offer" tells you exactly which post brought the conversation.

Writing the first DM

The first message decides whether the customer keeps talking. A few rules:

• Answer the question immediately. If they asked the price, the price goes in the first line.
• Ask one easy next question. "Which size do you need?" works better than a long menu.
• Sound like your brand, not a robot. Short sentences, friendly, and in the language your customers use.

A good example for a clothing page:

Hi! The linen kurta is Rs 2,450. We have S, M and L in stock, and delivery inside the valley is free. Which size should I keep for you?

Mistakes to avoid

• Sending a wall of text. Nobody reads five paragraphs in a DM.
• Dead ends. If the first message has no next step, the conversation stops.
• Triggering on everything. If every comment gets a DM, including "nice!" and emoji reactions, it feels like spam.
• No human backup. Someone will ask something unusual. Make sure those chats reach your team.

Measuring whether it's working

Comment automation is easy to measure, which is one of the reasons it's worth doing properly. For each post or campaign, track:

• Comments that triggered a DM. This tells you which posts create real interest, not just likes.
• Replies to that first DM. If people stop after the first message, your opening message needs work.
• Orders or leads from those conversations. The number that matters. Even a rough count in a spreadsheet beats guessing.
• Keyword misses. Read the comments that didn't trigger anything. You'll usually find a spelling or phrase you should add.

Compare posts against each other, not against some industry benchmark. Your own best-performing post is the most useful target you have.

A simple launch plan for your next post

1. Pick one product post you're about to publish or boost.
2. Choose three or four trigger words, including the romanized spellings your customers actually use.
3. Write the first DM: price first, one question at the end.
4. Add a short public reply so other people know to check their DMs.
5. After a week, read every conversation and fix what didn't work.

Starting with one post keeps it manageable and gives you a clean before-and-after comparison.

What happens after the DM

This is where keyword tools and AI tools differ. A keyword tool sends the first message and then waits. An AI-powered setup keeps going: it answers the follow-up questions about sizes, delivery to Butwal or payment by Khalti, collects the order details, and passes confirmed orders to your team.

If you want both the comment automation and the conversation that follows, Orbit does the two together. You can also pair it with AI comment replies so your comment section stays active. Book a demo and we'll set up a test on one of your own posts.